


Grieve

by ReaperWriter



Category: The Avengers (2012)
Genre: Comfort, Established Relationship, F/M, Grief/Mourning, Sexual Content
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-05-15
Updated: 2012-05-15
Packaged: 2017-11-05 10:02:25
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,795
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/405185
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ReaperWriter/pseuds/ReaperWriter
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>He could always count on Nat for vodka and comfort.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Grieve

**Author's Note:**

> My knowledge of the characters is entirely based on The Avengers movie and Wikipedia. My apologies for glaring canon errors.

From where he stands, leaning against the tree, in the shadows, the bright gleam of the brass on the shiny, black coffin hurts his eyes.  He would rather be up the tree, bow in hand, guarding them all, but Nat’s hand on his arm, the look in her eyes, stops him.

They are the two odd birds in a team of circus freaks and weirdos.  No crazy exo-skeleton powered by an internal arc reactor for them.  No super serum or gamma radiation making them insanely stronger, nigh on invincible.  And certainly no god like powers.  Even if the Red Room had enhanced Tasha in some ways, over all, they are startlingly, achingly human.  He knows, because he remembers the feeling of waking up the morning after that had taken chunky swaths out of Manhattan while saving the world to the feeling of at least two cracked ribs, splinters of glass, a strained back, and a shoulder he is pretty sure he re-located himself when he swung through that window.  Of seeing her after, his hand unconsciously rising to wipe the tacky blood from her scalp.

He can see her, there.  Standing stock still next to Pepper Potts, where she clings to Stark.  Steve Rogers is standing to her other side and back.  He can’t make out the sermon from the minister, but he has never found much comfort in that sort of thing, anyway.  There aren’t enough platitudes and parables, psalms and fables in the world to put this right.  He should be the one in the box, going into the ground.  Not Phil Coulson, the nicest spy you’ll ever meet.

Coulson, with his Captain America trading cards.  His snarky, smart assed wit, particularly after a run in with the great and powerful wizard of Stark Industries.  His calm reason when Fury was threatening to throw Barton off the helicarrier for going off book and bringing in the assassin he had been sent to end.  Coulson consistently had their backs.  More than once, his intervention had saved him, and Nat.  And now, he was gone.  A spear nick to the heart, a slow bleed out.  One of many agents now staining his ledger a deeper shade of crimson then Nat had ever contemplated.

His eyes had drifted closed, and stayed there, fighting the urge to scream at the injustice of it all, when he felt the small hand on his shoulder.  Opening them, he looked into her green eyes.  “Let’s go home,” she said, softly.  Looking past her, he saw that the black, shiny box had made its way down, six feet, and out of sight.

“Let’s go home.”

He doesn’t know what home she means, at first.  They both have standing quarters on the helicarrier, but it’s the last place he imagines any of them want to be right now.  There is his loft in the meat packing district, chosen for its open spaces and his ability to do target practice in doors if he feels like it without accidentally skewering a neighbor.  In the end though, home today is her place, a non-descript one bedroom condo in SoHo.  She closes the door behind them and points him to the couch, disappearing into the kitchen. 

The rattle of ice on glass follows, and a few minutes, the sound of ice dashing into the stainless steel of her sink.  It was a familiar ritual, one they had done a hundred times in a hundred different cities.  She appears again, two chilled glasses and the ice cold bottle of Zyr vodka on a tray.  There was never a question of mixers or limes or God-forbid, flavors, when it came to Natasha and vodka.  She drank it as mother Russia had intended it, cold and straight.  When it was his turn to host comfort, they drank tequila.

She pours them each a high ball glass.  “To Phil,” she says, softly.  They clink glasses and drink.  He finds himself starring at the carpet, feeling the fear and the self-loathing creep back in.  It tastes like bile and blood in his mouth.  “Hey, Barton.  Come back to me, Clint.”

He looks up, into those green eyes again.  They remind him of a piece of sea glass he found once, when he was a kid.  Before his folks…before…before.  Now, they were looking at him with concern and an emotion they were neither willing to name.  Emotions like that were messy and complex, and they both try to keep things simple.  Or at least, claim to.

“Sorry,” he said.  “I just can’t get it to stop.  Any of it.  It’s like some sick video on loop.  Even when he…even when Loki was there, in my head, controlling me, I was still there.  It was like being paralyzed and unable to move, or think, or breathe.  Like drowning, constantly, under the weight.”

“There was nothing you could have done,” she says, pouring them a second glass.  “It wasn’t your fault.”

“I could have killed you, Nat,” he whispers, before slamming the cool liquid and feeling it hit his veins like ice.  “And Phil…”

“Loki killed Phil,” she replies firmly, taking the drink from his hand.  “And you haven’t killed me yet.”

“It’s not funny.”  Anger boils up in him, overriding the shame for the moment. 

“It’s not.”  Her hand finds his face, soft all things considered.  “But you have to focus on moving forward, or the weight will cripple you.  Trust me, I know.”

He wants to argue, but she is the mistress of reinvention, of turning to the light, and every argument his mind can manifest makes no dent.  He leans into her hand, leans his forehead to hers, and breathes in the smell of her hair.  And as if by some weird psychic skill, she leans in and kisses him, no more words to say.

It’s nothing like their first time, which was all adrenaline and post mission high, a fuck to work off the excess energy and nothing more.  That first time, he had never expected this to be where they would end up, but if he did believe in God, he would think maybe he had done something in his whole miserable life right.

The kiss is soft, and fragile, like a butterfly against the side of his lips, until he opens to her and her tongue slips inside, tasting his mouth, imparting Vodka and something else that is entirely her.  Her fingers move around his head, raking into his short hair, and he can feel himself getting lost in this, in her.  He breaks the kiss and looks at her, and without a word she stands, and takes his hand, leading him to her bedroom.

The queen sized bed, with its sleigh frame and its silk rose coverlet, looks like something out of a fairy tale.  Not that he has ever once mistaken Tasha for someone who needs much rescuing.  She saves his life at least as often as he saves hers, and that is what it feels like when she reaches behind her back and unzips the modest black dress she wore for the funeral.  Underneath, the black and nude lace of her bra, panties, and matching garter belt just about undo him.  He’s never known another woman who loved thigh highs and garters the way she does. 

She moves to him and pulls loose his tie before going to work on the buttons of his shirt.  His jacket lay where he left it, in the back of her car.  Soon, the white shirt joined her dress on the floor, followed by his shoes, socks, and suit pants.  The simple boxers almost looked ridiculous next to the lingerie she still wore, but she didn’t seem to mind as she stepped into his arms, meeting his kiss, her arms drawing around him again.

He’s always loved the way she smells when they aren’t on a case.  Something like lilacs and powder and a hint of musk, and he’s losing himself in hair, his face buried just below the ear he is nibbling while one hand finds he breast and massages it through the fabric of her bra.  She murmurs something he can’t understand in Russian and back them to the bed, laying down across it as he kneels over her.

Her nails rake a line down his back from his scalp to the base of his spine, and he presses himself against her.  She always did call the play, even when it seemed like she wasn’t.  Tonight he doesn’t mind, willing to follow her somewhere his mind can go silent and still.

Soon, her bra is gone and his lips are sucking gently at one of her perfect, full breasts, making her writhe beneath him, her hand slipping up to cup him through the cotton of his boxers.  He slides his free hand down and under the scrap of lace at her apex, finding her hot and wet, and Christ…

Sliding the panties free, then his own boxers, he reaches for the nightstand where he knows she keeps the condoms, only to have her take it from him.  She makes short work of the package and unrolls it slowly over him as his fingers laze over the little nub at the joinder of her thighs.  She moans, and her eyes drift shut, and he adores these times, when they aren’t Barton and Romanov, not the Hawk and the Widow, just Clint and Tasha, just two people taking solace and joy where they can find it.

He moves over her and presses slowly into her, taking his time, even when her hips rise up to meet him.  It takes control and patience, two things he has in spades, and she squirms, trying to move him along.  “Minx” he whispers, and she laughs that throaty, breathless laugh she has, the one she hides from most of the world, and suddenly they’re in tandem.  Like their fighting together, or dancing, maybe.  Rhythm and heat and motion consume what’s left of their senses, pushing them onward and upwards, spiraling through the night air.  With the last of the conscious thought he can muster, he slides his hand between them and strokes once, twice, and then she is keening and shuddering around him, the pulsing of her drawing him over the edge after.

In the still quiet later, he lays his head against his chest and listens to her heart beat.  It’s regular and strong and still a little fast, which isn’t surprising, since his own could match it.  And for the first time in days, Clint shuts his eyes and doesn’t see the horror show of the last few weeks.  As he drifts off, her hand stroking his hair, he thinks he might find a little peace tonight.

 


End file.
